es
and habits of the first value to the military man. Still, there is
something not only excusable, but laudable, in a man magnifying his
office; and it was well that my friend the professor should have a
slightly exaggerated idea of the bearing of the calculus on the daily
routine or occasional emergencies of a ship. What is needed is a
counterpoise, to correct undue deflection of the like kind, to which
an educational institution from its very character and object is
always liable. That the Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the
Sabbath, is a saying of wide application. The administrator tends to
think more of his administrative machine than of the object for which
it exists, and the educator to forget that while the foundation is
essential, it yet exists only for the building, which is the
"practical" end in view. The object of naval education is to make a
naval officer. Too much as well as too little of one ingredient will
mar the compound; and if exaggeration cannot be wholly avoided, it had
better rest upon the professional side. This was the function
discharged by the critical attitude of the outside service, such as my
friend of the railroad; at times somewhat irrational, but still as a
check effective after the manner of other public opinion, of which in
fact it was an instance.

In September, 1856, when I entered, professional influence was perhaps
in excess. The preceding June had seen the graduation of the last
class of "oldsters"--of those who, after five years at sea, had spent
the sixth at the Academy, subjected formally to its discipline and
methods. I therefore just missed seeing that phase of the Academy's
history; but I could not thereby escape the traces of its influence.
However transient, this lasted my time. It may be imagined what an
influential, yet incongruous, element in a crowd of boys was
constituted by introducing among them twenty or thirty young men, too
young for ripeness, yet who for five years had been bearing the not
slight responsibility of the charge of seamen, often on duty away from
their superiors, and permitted substantially all the powers and
privileges conceded to their seniors, men of mature years. How could
such be brought under the curb of the narrowly ordered life of the
school, for the short eight months to which they knew the ordeal was
restricted? Could this have been attempted seriously, there would
probably have been an explosion; but in truth, as far as my
o